Alternate side moratorium continues another month

With Con Edison work continuing throughout Riverdale, the city’s sanitation department has extended a moratorium on alternate side street parking through the end of August.

The moratorium, according to Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz’s office, includes:

• Both sides of Greystone Avenue from Manhattan College Parkway to West 238th Street.

•Both sides of Waldo Avenue from Manhattan College Parkway to West 238th.

• Both sides of Dash Place between West 242nd Street to Waldo.

• Both sides of West 240th Street from Greystone to Dash.

Drivers who park their cars in those areas will not receive summonses from the sanitation department for failing to abide by normal alternate side rules until September. If someone does receive a summons, Dinowitz says they can call his office at (718) 796-5345.

No more smoking at NYCHA properties

If you’re looking to light a cigarette anywhere in or around property managed by the New York City Housing Authority, think again.

NYCHA now prohibits smoking in any New York City public housing apartment or building, or within 25 feet of any building.

It’s part of a new rule issued by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which required all public housing agencies nationwide to go smoke-free by July 30.

Those caught smoking can see anything from an informal conversation about the smoking ban, but not to terminate tenancies, officials said.

Former IDC members have to give back contributions

A group formed to support state Sen. Jeff Klein’s former Independent Democratic Conference may have to return $1.4 million in campaign donations after the elections board chief enforcement officer found those donations were over the legal limit.

The Senate Independence Campaign Committee raisedsome $2.5 million, moving hundreds of thousands of dollars to the campaign accounts of several former IDC members, according to the New York Daily News.

The funds were illegally raised and distributed, evading campaign contribution limits, said Carla DiMarco, associate counsel for the elections board.

That money is important for several of the former IDC members — the one-time breakaway group of Democrats led by Klein who caucused with Republicans — because some are facing primary battles for their seats.

Barbara Brancaccio, speaking on behalf of the former IDC members, told the newspaper the elections board overstepped its authority. She also said the release of a letter in the middle of a “heated political campaign is an abuse of her powers.”